6/09/2010 @ 6:00PM

More People, Less Pollution

Are more people bad for the environment? Common sense tells us “yes”: More people, the thinking goes, means fewer of our fixed natural resources to go around, and it means more people causing more pollution. However, the truth is people are assets, not liabilities. In short, people are not pollution.

For centuries human beings have complained about overpopulation. Of course, the individuals making such arguments have viewed their own births as a boon to humanity. After all, without them who would be around to warn about too many births?

The late economist Julian Simon criticized the views of noted doomsayer ecologist Paul Ehrlich, who favored radical population control to save the environment and prevent mass starvation. Such starvation, it turned out, never occurred, despite Ehrlich’s predictions in the 1960s that millions would die of famine, even possibly in the U.S. To Simon, the issue came down to economics, as well as hypocrisy and elitism. “The Ehrlich argument boils down to an inverted (or perverted) Golden Rule: Do unto others–prevent their existence–what you are glad no one did to you.”

Economists view more people in an economy as beneficial. “The most important benefit of population size and growth is the increase it brings to the stock of useful knowledge,” Simon wrote in his book The Ultimate Resource 2. “Minds matter economically as much as, or more than, hands or mouths. Progress is limited largely by the availability of trained workers.”

Those additional minds are inventing ways to solve problems and produce innovations that have already led to cleaner cars and better ways to provide our energy needs. Natural gas is hailed as one of the cleanest forms of energy. University of Michigan-Flint economist Mark J. Perry, founder of the popular blog Carpe Diem, notes the U.S. has become the largest producer of natural gas in the world. He explains this happened due to a breakthrough in drilling technology. Only seven years ago Alan Greenspan, then chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, warned America about the dire consequences if we began seeing shortages of natural gas; now no one has to worry about a shortage of natural gas. Given enough time and the freedom to invest and innovate, predictions of natural resource depletion are eventually proven wrong.

Life expectancy is perhaps the best measure of health, including environmental health, since airborne and water-related diseases have been traditional killers. If increased pollution and less availability of resources were the natural consequence of an increased population, then one would expect a decline in life expectancy when America’s population more than doubled in the 20th century. In fact, the opposite happened.

Between 1930 and 2000 life expectancy in the U.S. increased from approximately 60 years to 77 years. One reason people started living longer is the improvements brought about by increased economic growth. In a column for the American Enterprise Institute’s Enterprise Blog, Jonah Goldberg noted the remarkable connection between an increase in life expectancy and real gross domestic product (per capita). He points out people born in countries with a real GDP per capita of $20,000 to $50,000 can expect to live about 80 years, while those in poor countries with a low GDP per capita will typically only live until age 55. Goldberg explains, “Economic growth pays for a cleaner environment, better work conditions and longer life expectancy.”

In addition to increases in life expectancy, the U.S. has seen improvements in environmental indicators. “Nationwide, emissions of criteria pollutants (or the pollutants that form them) due to human activities have decreased,” according to the Environmental Protection Agency. “Between 1990 and 2002 emissions of carbon monoxide, volatile organic compounds (which lead to the formation of ozone), particulate matter, sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides (which lead to the formation of ozone and particulate matter) decreased by differing amounts, ranging from 17% to 44%. For lead, emissions have decreased by 99%, but this reduction is based on data that span a longer timeframe (1970 to 2002).” Gregg Easterbrook, author of The Progress Paradox, argues, “The steady environmental improvement in the United States should be a subject of national pride.”

The population of the world has increased over the past decades at the same time that the quality of life, including the air breathed and water consumed, has improved in countries with stable political systems and market-oriented economies. Trying to limit the number of people born–or allowed into the country–to improve the environment is counterproductive. Countries that create more wealth produce societies where people live longer and can afford technological solutions to energy production and environmental protection. If you are reading this article, then be happy your birth was not prevented or discouraged in a quixotic effort to improve the environment. It’s good to be alive.

Stuart Anderson is executive director of the National Foundation for American Policy, a nonpartisan research group based in Arlington, Va.